Participants join the challenge through the mobile app, choose poems, learn them by heart, record videos of themselves reciting from memory, and share their progress, gradually building a personal collection of memorized works. The app provides the technical foundation for the challenge, allowing participants to manage their involvement, record their chosen poems, track completed assignments, and maintain a history of their progress.
The project's first annual challenge, 12 Poems in 12 Months, invites participants to learn one poem every month for an entire year.
«By Heart» is not a competition or a performance contest. It is a long-term practice that helps strengthen memory, improve public speaking and diction, broaden literary knowledge, and rediscover classical and modern poetry. Sharing progress publicly helps participants stay motivated, while the community transforms an individual practice into a shared cultural project.
Created for people who want more than simply reading poetry, By Heart encourages participants to make it part of their lives—one poem, one month, and one year at a time.